Zebre Rugby Club team to face Ulster Rugby

Zebre left Parma this morning for Northern Ireland where they will face Ulster Rugby on Saturday evening (Kingspan Stadium, 7:35pm).

Ulster are included in Conference B of the Guinness PRO14 like Leinster, Zebre’s last opponent.

The Zebre technical staff had to do without several players capped by the Italian national team, who host Ireland in Rome on Sunday February 24.

There are seven Zebre Rugby players retained by the Azzurri, with two enlisted for the trip to Northern Ireland: Centre Bisegni and the fly-half Canna, both starters tomorrow night as they were seven days ago at the Stadio Zaffanella.

Licata and Zilocchi are the latest players to join the injury list.

Head coach Michael Bradley has called four permit players, all former players of the Ivan Francescato National Under 20 Academy.

Three of them take part in the top Italian Top12 tournament: back row Jacopo Bianchi of Fiamme Oro, loose-head prop Danilo Fischetti of Rugby Calvisano who already boasts two caps in the Guinness PRO14 and debutant Alessandro Mordacci; included in the Valorugby Emilia roster this year.

The fourth permit player is another debutant, lock Lorenzo Masselli, born in 1997 in Johannesburg in South Africa, and plays his rugby for the Lyons Piacenza, leaders of the second national tournament, Serie A.

In total there are seven changes in the starting XV with two in the back line. Balekana will start on the wing, De Battista who will start at inside centre.

In the pack, the tight-head prop Bello is back in action as is Krumov in the second-row, pairing with captain Biagi.

The back row is completely new with the two Pacific Island flankers Tauyavuca and Brown on the sides of young number 8 Bianchi.

Live coverage of the game in Italy on live streaming on DAZN on www.dazn.com. Live text coverage of the game on www.pro14rugby.org and on Zebre Rugby twitter account with the official game hashtag #ULSvZEB